


Revelations

by LadyRazorsharp



Category: Thunderbirds
Genre: F/M, Gen, Ridley joins International Rescue, Surprise Twins, What-If, photo album, wee tracys
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-15
Updated: 2020-05-15
Packaged: 2021-03-03 00:20:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,806
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24195799
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyRazorsharp/pseuds/LadyRazorsharp
Summary: As a new bride on the Island, Ridley comes across some surprising info...and has a revelation of her own.
Relationships: Captain Ridley O'Bannon/John Tracy, Tanusha "Kayo" Kyrano/Virgil Tracy
Comments: 2
Kudos: 23





	Revelations

**_AN: Riffing on something @willow-salix suggested by discussion of the original plans for John to be the hero in TOS, not Scott…until Gerry Anderson changed all that!_ **

**Revelations**

_ Surprise, surprise… _

Ridley Kathleen Tracy, nee O’Bannon, was not the first bride to make her home on Tracy Island; that distinction belonged to one Tanusha Kyrano Tracy--although Kayo had been stationed on the island practically since its designation as the Tracy home base, so that really didn’t count. 

No, Ridley was the first person to be brought home by a Tracy boy with the intent to make the island her home, and doing so had presented a few logistical challenges--none that were insurmountable (she had married a _ Tracy, _ after all), but they were present all the same. The first challenge, she was amused to find, was where to put her: The villa might have been expansive, but the second-floor bank of suites had been designed with  _ single men _ in mind. Would it prove to be intrusive to both the newlywed couple and their in-laws if she moved in with John? 

Although Kayo’s move into Virgil’s room should have rendered this question academic, Gordon and Alan had seen an opportunity--one of many that had begun with the wedding itself and somehow still hadn’t ended--to embarrass their elder brother, as well as conduct the necessary experiment. With Gordon in John’s room, banging on the walls and yelling things like OH JOHN TAKE ME YOU STUDLY HUNK OF MAN YOU at the top of his lungs, Alan stood in Scott’s room and listened for any hint of noise. There was none detected (though just to be certain, Gordon yelled a few more things that John would not, with any amount of coaxing, deign to repeat), so Operation Sister In Law was given a green light to proceed.

When it was all said and done, Ridley didn’t have much in the way of worldly goods to endow her billionaire groom with; as an astronaut, she was keenly aware of what was essential, and what was just excess. Standing at the closet, Ridley realized that John had more clothes than she did, ranging from beautifully cut tuxedo at one end to a few of his oddly patterned button-down shirts at the other, with formal pumps, polished brogues, and well-used Roper boots below. Her side of the closet held her ‘little black dress,’ her GDF dress uniform, a pair of white cigarette pants that dressed up or down as needed, a black button down blouse that went with the pants, a half-dozen pair of jeans, a slouchy sweater, and four slim tee-shirts. As for footwear, she had the heels that went with her dress and the skinny pants, her low uniform heels, and a pair of trainers that had seen many miles on the Global-One treadmill. Her beloved Tieks flats, an indulgent present to herself on her last birthday, were on her feet. 

Other than her meager wardrobe, most of her possessions fit in a single sturdy box and were easily slotted into John’s spare decor. Photos of her parents and her friends, her framed diploma from the University of Illinois, and an antique print of the Blessed Virgin she’d received at her Confirmation all found places on the walls, and the few precious print books she had--several of which were duplicates of books in John’s own library--were soon at home in his floor-to-ceiling wall of bookshelves. Her jewelry box, holding a pair of diamond clips that had belonged to her grandmother, a faux-diamond tennis bracelet, and her father’s wedding ring perched nicely atop John’s bureau, looking as if it had been there for years. She was wearing her only other pieces of jewelry, a gold Crucifix (another Confirmation gift) and her wedding set.

Everything else was in storage back in Illinois, and even that wasn’t much; just a few pieces of furniture from her parents’ house and her mother’s wedding china. She didn’t need either in the palatial, well-equipped digs she found herself in, so she left them there for the time being.

They’d enjoyed their time in Kansas at the family homestead, and a few days at the Cape to see friends and colleagues, but they’d ended up coming home early to enjoy some island time before John jumped back into the grind of International Rescue. After completing the final blending of her possessions into his, Ridley was seated in John’s favorite reading chair, paging through an album she’d seen on one of the lower shelves of his bookcase when her husband walked in, dressed in tank top, running shorts, and jogging shoes. He was wiping his face with a towel when she looked up at him with a smile.

“Hey,” she ventured, gazing with appreciation at his lean, if sweaty, form. “Looks like you finally got in that run with Scott.”

He rubbed at his hair with the towel and smiled down at her. “Finally. Only the earliest of early birds catches Scott Tracy, but he delayed his run today just so we could go together.”

“Aw, that was sweet of him.” Ridley flipped another page. “I was just looking through your album; I’m enjoying seeing all of you as kids. He looks like he was a great person to have as a big brother growing up.”

John peered over her shoulder at the photos. “For the most part, he was. Of course, when he started dating, we were all just a bunch of pests.” He smirked and shucked off his running shoes. “I haven’t seen those pictures in a while; let me get cleaned up and I’ll look with you.”

She closed the book and set it aside. “I’ve got a much better idea,” she suggested, wiggling her eyebrows at him.

The noise of the spray pattering on the tile followed his next words. “I thought you already got a shower,” he called back.

“Yeah,” she hedged, “but we’re still on on our honeymoon. Isn’t it a given that we’re supposed to be going at it like bunnies or something?”

“Where’d you hear that?” He snorted and ducked around the doorframe, displaying a lot of freckled skin. “Probably from someone with the last name of ‘Tracy,’ no doubt.”

Ridley grinned. “Well, I’ll at least help you scrub your back,” she offered, shimmying out of her jeans and stripping off her shirt as she followed him into the bathroom.

“It just so happens that there’s an opening for that position.” John plucked the loofah-on-a-stick off the shower wall and presented it to her. “Congratulations, you’re hired.”

She took it from him with a wicked gleam in her eye. “I look forward to a very long and fruitful partnership,” she purred.

Later, snuggled together in their bed with their hair still damp, Ridley opened the album to the page where she’d stopped. Together, they looked at the photos of John’s life with his brothers, first at the homestead in Kansas and then on the island as it was built up around them. The book ended with a photo of him in a prototype of his uniform, half-dressed and caught looking up at the camera with a vague expression, as if someone had called his name to get his attention. “When was this taken?” she asked, tapping on the photo.

He studied it with a critical eye. “Hmm. Probably no more than a year before our shakedown. My uniform was still in construction, as you can see.” He let her close the book, and sat with his fingertips lightly drumming the cover. “Have you seen all of the albums?” he asked.

His tone was so odd that Ridley twisted in his embrace to study him. “I thought I got them all,” she said warily. “Why?”

John shook his head. “You’re missing one.” He threw back the covers and climbed out of bed, the diffused sunlight lighting his flick to warm red-gold. The hems of his star-printed sleep pants brushed the boards as he padded on silent feet over to the bookshelf, and his knees popped slightly as he squatted to search for the elusive volume. “Ah, here it is. I was reorganizing my shelves in preparation for your arrival, and I grouped all the albums together so you could see them. Looks like I missed this one.” He found the book and slipped it from the shelf, then crossed the room and re-settled himself comfortably. “Here’s a chapter of Tracy history known only to its participants,” he said, laying the book in her hands.

“Cryptic,” she mused. “Do you need to swear me to secrecy or something?”

He smiled. “No, nothing like that, but the press would have a field day with this juicy little nugget of information.”

Ridley’s eyebrows rose. “I see. Well since I’m part of this family now, my lips are sealed.” She reached up to bring his lips down to hers. “There. Now they’re _ definitely _ sealed.”

He smiled, but said nothing and merely reached around her to flip open the cover, revealing a photo of two swaddled babies laying in the arms of a sweet-faced, redheaded woman. Ridley’s brows drew together as she studied the photo.

“Twins?” she asked, looking up at him for confirmation. At his nod, she bent to study the book a little more closely. “That’s your mom, right?”

“Right.”

Her heart twinging as it always did when confronted with the mother-in-law she would never meet, Ridley gazed at the drowsing infants cuddled next to Lucille. One had a full head of dark hair, but the other sported a scrawl of fine copper across its downy head. With a soft gasp of indrawn breath, Ridley made the mental connection. “That’s  _ you!” _

John smiled gently. “Right again.”

“Oh, but--” Ridley blinked at the tiny sleeping face of his twin and bit her lip as the implications dawned in her mind. “What happened to him?” she murmured, touching the photo with reverent fingers.

Her husband reached out for the album. “Turn the page and you’ll see.”

Still chewing on her lip, Ridley turned the page--and let out a surprised laugh. Two cribs were featured in the photo, one on either side of a snug nursery done in a vivid palette of navy blue, grey, and orange. Pennant bunting was fastened on the walls above each crib, silver-grey on one side and orange on the other. SCOTT, read the grey pennants, while the orange spelled out JOHN.

“You and Scott are _ twins?” _ Ridley spluttered. “I can’t believe I never figured that out.”

John chuckled. “So far, no one else has, either.” He shrugged. “It’s a small detail, but it’s a personal one, and we’ve just kept it to ourselves. Nothing sinister about it, really.”

“You’ve a right to keep something to yourselves,” Ridley agreed. “So who’s older?”

“Scott. He truly is my big brother, by seven and a half minutes.”

“I see.” Ridley turned another page and smiled at a photo of both boys dressed alike and sitting up. Scott was giving the camera a gap-toothed grin, while John stuffed a plastic giraffe against his gums. “Good grief, that’s adorable.”

Together they paged through the album, revealing photos of the twins in school uniforms and scouting outfits. The other boys began to make appearances: Scott and John looking on with pride at a bright-eyed infant Virgil in his crib; all three eldest sitting with a tiny sleeping Gordon cradled in John’s lap. However, when the twins looked to be nearing their first decade, it was clear to see their personalities were beginning to diverge. Here was a photo of Scott, headset on and grinning from the copilot’s seat of Jeff’s Cessna; there was a photo of John, hard at work making a model of the solar system from an untwisted wire hanger and styrofoam balls. 

Then came a more sobering photo of Scott, John, and Virgil wearing scaled-down protective gowns and masks, all crowded around a medical bassinet. Inside the plastic box lay an alarmingly tiny child, its miniature frame swimming in a doll-sized diaper. Wires and lines lay everywhere, and the red rocket plushie tucked into one corner was nearly as big as its intended recipient. Tears filled Ridley’s eyes as she traced one fragile arm. “Alan?”

“Yeah. He was eight weeks early, and got a bit of a rough start.” John sighed. “Wouldn’t know it now to look at him, would you?”

“No, absolutely not.” She gazed for a moment more at the tender photo, then turned another page. The pictures began to feature more of John exclusively, some with his twin and the others making occasional appearances. One photo, of John in an airman’s dress blues, made her stop and stare. “Wait, so you  _ were _ in the Air Force,” she said, flipping the page to find both of the twins in their dress uniforms, diplomas in hand and hair buzzed in boot-camp style. 

John snorted. “It was a very brief stint,” he informed her. “Scott took to military life like he was born to it. I...did not.” He shook his head. “I joined up first, and when I told everyone about it, Scott immediately did the same. I wanted to be an astronaut, and at the time, I didn’t see how I could get there without military service. Scott just wanted to fly.” John turned the page to reveal Scott in a flight suit, helmet in hand and flashing a thumbs-up at the camera from behind mirrored shades. “I did my initial tour as a programmer for a few mobile units, but when people found out that I was Jeff Tracy’s kid, doors started flying open. Just like that, I was on my way to the Cape so I could test into the space program.”

Ridley frowned at him. “But you didn’t stay, because your dad started International Rescue.”

He waggled a hand in a yes/no motion. “Well, that wasn’t the whole reason I left.”

“Oh, right, that eye thing you have.” Ridley squinted her own eyes. “Retinosa--? I always get it wrong.”

_ “Retinitis pigmentosa _ \--you can call it ‘RP’ for short.” He leaned down and kissed the back of her neck. “Like I told you before, It’s not painful, but over time, it narrows your field of vision. Exposure to UV rays hastens the damage.”

“Lemme guess, they spotted it while you were in training?”

John nodded. “During a routine eye exam.” He rested his forehead against her crown. “My mom’s dad had it. In his time, they were close to a cure; in fact, he volunteered for some trials, but he passed away before the process was perfected. Now there’s both a drug that heals the retina and a painless laser procedure that removes scar tissue. I’ve only needed to have the surgery once, right before we started International Rescue. Since then, I’ve had an eye exam every six months to make sure I’m still in remission.”

Ridley squeezed his hands. “I can’t imagine what a blow that must have been, to think your career as an astronaut was grounded even before it began.” She sighed. “Some might call your dad crazy, but thank God for him.”

“Dad knew exactly where he wanted us from day one, but he let us make the final choice.” John chuckled. “Here’s a bit of family gossip: Valene--you know her as Colonel Casey, but she’s our godmother—had a few choice words for Dad when she realized she wouldn’t get a chance at me.” His smile gained an edge of mischief. “Apparently she had some sort of a huge GDF space station in the works about the time we got started; you might have heard about it.”

Ridley turned to grin up at him. “Oh  _ yeah,  _ I think I’ve heard of that. Has some crazy astronaut in charge; I hear she’s in love with a hot redheaded billionaire.” 

_ “No,”  _ John gasped in mock scandal. He lowered his head to nibble her ear. “Do tell.”

She leaned back to let his lips travel down her neck for a few delicious inches, but then she snorted and began to giggle. John disengaged himself from her skin, a puzzled smirk on his face. “What’s so funny?”

“I just realized what you said: Val Casey had you pegged for  _ my _ job.” Ridley laughed. “And now she’s probably thinking she’s going to lose  _ both _ of us to International Rescue. I wondered why she seemed so annoyed at our wedding.” They laughed together for a moment, but then Ridley sobered. “So, could _ you  _ be flying Thunderbird One instead of Scott?”

John shrugged. “Technically, we can all fly her. We’ve all been trained to step in with each other’s ‘birds if we need to.” He leaned back against the headboard. “I like flying her; she’s an incredible machine. However, Scott is the one who makes her live and breathe, if you get my meaning. It’s the same with the rest of them; ‘Two is Virgil’s baby, and ‘Four is Gordon’s. Alan and ‘Three are so tight, I don’t even want to try and get between them.”

Ridley laid back against him. “It’s hard to imagine Virgil or Gordon answering the comm up at ‘Five instead of you.”

“They can, and that’s true to Dad’s vision of International Rescue,” John countered. “Like I said, we all have our specialties, the places where we feel the most at home, but we know that we can stand in for each other.”

Ridley picked up his hand and brought it to her lips, then lowered it to her lap and let her fingers explore his long digits. Unlike his brothers, he had no calluses, and the sensation of his smooth skin brought a question out of her. “You consider yourselves to be on equal footing? No one’s the first, the best, the greatest?”

“We’re not allowed to think like that,” John answered. “Every team needs a captain, and Scott’s ours. If you took a vote amongst us, we’d all say that Virgil deserves top honors. He’s on nearly every call.”

“He’s a powerhouse, in more ways than one,” Ridley agreed. “I don’t believe I’ve ever met a more unselfish person in my entire life.” She blushed and gave an uncomfortable little laugh. “Well, what I mean is--”

John smiled down at her. “No, you’re right. Scott’s our standard-bearer, our inspiration. Virgil’s our heart. I’m the brain, I guess.”

“Mm.” Ridley brought him down to her and kissed his forehead. “I like your brain. It was the first thing I was attracted to.”

Her words brought a genuine grin to her husband’s face. “You brake for nerds?”

“Absolutely.” She chuckled. “If you’re the brain, then Gordon is most definitely the laughter. Alan is…” She pursed her lips in thought. “What would Alan be? The innocence?”

John shook his head. “He’s our courage. He’ll walk into hell itself, if we ask him to.”

“I know he would.” She shifted the book off her lap and tugged his arms tighter around her. “I was there when he and Virgil blew up Fischler’s comet; that’s as close to hell as I wanna get in this life.”

“Me too.” 

The memory of those intense minutes rolled through Ridley’s mind, and from how tightly John was holding her, she knew he was reliving them, too. During those chaotic minutes, she’d realized she was in love with John, but without International Rescue, she would have never been able to tell him. If it had not been for the heroic efforts of her brothers-in-law, none of them--along with a sizable portion of Earth’s population--would have lived to tell the tale.

With the echo of Alan and Virgil’s voices in her ear, and the explosion of the comet playing against the movie screen of her mind, a question she’d been wrestling with for weeks became crystal clear. 

“John,” she said quietly. “I’ve come to an important decision.”

He didn’t stir from his protective embrace, and when he spoke, his voice was just as quiet. “What’s that?”

“I want to join International Rescue.”

John drew in a slow breath. “You do?”

Ridley nodded. “Scott told me that marrying you didn’t automatically mean I had to join International Rescue,” she began. “However, I don’t think I can refuse. No, hear me out,” she retorted when he made a noise of protest. “What I mean is, when I see what you and your brothers do--hell, you rescued _ me _ twice--I want to be a part of it.” She turned to look up at him. “There must be an incredible amount of satisfaction in doing what you do.”

He nodded. “There is, but the other side of the coin...” he trailed off, his eyes shuttering closed. “That side is very dark. When you  _ don’t  _ save them. When you  _ can’t _ reach them.” He swallowed. “When they ask me to tell their loved ones good-bye for them. When they spill out their sins to me, as if I were a priest hearing their last Confession.” He shook his head. “It’s incredible and exhilarating, and yet there’s days I wonder if I’ll ever be happy again. Ask the guys; they’ll tell you the same. It’s worse for them in some ways, since they often see what I don’t.” John reached down to caress her cheek. “When EOS came along, I found the partner I didn’t know I needed--but of course she’s got her own limitations.” He raised his voice a fraction. “No offense.”

“None taken,” said a prim little voice that came from everywhere and nowhere.

Ridley smirked at him. “That’s another thing I’m gonna have to get used to--our silent watchman.”

John chuckled. “She and I have had a few long talks about privacy, but there may be a few hiccups.” He sobered and tightened his hold on his bride. “I’d be glad to have you beside me, but I want you to know exactly what you’re getting into. Don’t say yes just because of this.” He brought her be-ringed left hand up to his lips and kissed it.

“When I took the job as captain of Global One, I did so because I felt it was meaningful to the human race,” Ridley said, studying their matching gold bands. “The experiments, the projects, the overarching experiment of bringing people from all walks of life to live together in a space station--I felt it was all important work. I’m like you, though--that work was a stepping stone into where I truly belong.” She snuggled deeper into his embrace.  _ “This _ is where I truly belong.”

“Well then,” he murmured in her ear. “Let me be the first to say ‘welcome aboard.’”

She snorted. “Oh, I’m sure you can do better than that.”

“You’re right,” he purred, and together they sank into the soft mattress, all else forgotten.

  
\--End--


End file.
